Wild Frontier Popular Attractions

Take a slow stroll along the Heritage Walk from Barberton Museum to see a relic from yesteryear. This lovely old locomotive was brought to Barberton on its own steam in 1971, having served on the railway line between Barberton and Kaapmuiden from 1899. The Barberton Steam Locomotive was manufactured in 1898 by Nielson & Co. for the Cape Government Railways. The Kaapmuiden-Barberton railway line was opened on 1 April 1896 and similar locomotives were used on it.

The Makhonjwa Mountains around Barberton are renowned for their ancient green rocks with their unique scientific record of the pre-history of the earth and for the human stories in pursuit of hidden gold.Also referred to as the ‘Genesis of Life’, its geology includes the best preserved truly ancient rocks on earth. Despite the rocks being 3.5 billion years old they are so well preserved that their fossils faithfully record the earliest life forms on the planet as well as evidence of the first recorded massive meteorite impact.Come to Barberton for the most spectacular sceneries, over the mountain for picnic, and if the beauty does not hold you back too long, a trip to Songimvelo Nature Reserve."The oldest well preserved sedimentary and volcanic rocks on Earth. ... These rock layers are like the pages of a book that we can read and translate in terms of early Earth's history. Here in Barberton is the Rosetta Stone for this period of time." Prof Don Lowe, Stanford University"The rocks of the Barberton region represent the best-preserved example of the Earth's ancient oceanic and continental crust." Profs Terence McCarthy and Bruce Rubidge, University of the Witwatersrand